ROCKFORD - Voters may be asked to weigh in on the city's union contract negotiations in 2014.

Mayor Larry Morrissey wants a referendum on the next ballot that would ask if neutral arbitrators should be prohibited from awarding union contract provisions - think employee raises - that would result in higher taxes.

The referendum wouldn't be binding and it would have no effect on how an arbitrator rules on a contested contract.

It also wouldn't exactly change the standard operating procedure for Illinois arbitrators even if it were binding. Few, if any, arbitrators have awarded a wage increase under the assumption that the city could afford it by raising taxes.

But by passing the referendum, voters could help pressure state lawmakers to take a look at how arbitrators factor in issues like a down economy and a city's ability to pay for raises when they rule on a contested contract, Morrissey said.

"We'd like to have it so that the city's ability to pay is the primary driver for if an arbitrator even considers an increase in wages," Morrissey said.

By rule, arbitrators have a number of factors they need to consider when deciding a contested issue. It's up to the arbitrator to assess each situation and determine which of the factors is most prevalent in that particular case.

Why now?

The need for the referendum goes back to 2010, during city contract negotiations with the police union, Morrissey said.

The officers wanted raises, but city officials said they couldn't afford them during the height of budget cuts in the Great Recession.

The union argued the city could pay, and as proof, representatives told arbitrator Byron Yaffe that the city hadn't levied a 5 percent utility tax that it had the authority to levy, arbitration records show.

"It's astonishing to me that an arbitrator can induce a tax increase," Morrissey said.

But the arbitrator didn't induce a tax increase. The city won that wage battle. Yaffe threw out the union's argument and in his final ruling he cited the general economic decline and the city's inability to pay for raises as for why he sided with the city.

In short, the arbitrator ruled exactly as the referendum would demand he rule.

Self-regulating system

Interest arbitration is designed to be a self-regulating system since both the municipality and the union need to agree on which arbitrator will rule on the contract. The idea is that if an arbitrator consistently favors one side, the other side would never agree to hire him.

The Illinois Department of Labor publishes each arbitrator's history of rulings online.

Since 2006, arbitration decisions have been virtually even, falling in a union's favor 51 percent of the time and in a municipality's favor 49 percent of the time, a Register Star review showed.

The city lost a wage fight with its fire union in 2011. Firefighters asked for 6 percent raises while the city offered 2 percent. Again, the arbitrator weighed the city's ability to pay. Only this time, arbitrator Robert Perkovich ruled that the city didn't prove that it couldn't pay. The union, however, showed that Rockford had gotten higher than expected revenues that year and had reserves that were four times the amount needed to keep an "excellent" credit rating, Perkovich stated.

Ald. Tom McNamara, D-3, questioned what the referendum would accomplish.

"I don't think we need this on the ballot to show that people don't like tax increases," McNamara said. "I don't think an arbitrator should tell us what we can or can't afford, but I think working to repair any broken relations with the unions would be a far greater use of time than passing something like this."

A motion to put the referendum on the March ballot failed Monday in a 4-5 vote, with five alderman absent from the holiday-week meeting. The issue could be brought back to a vote, but the earliest the referendum could make the ballot would be in the November general election.